books

“The authors unlock the doors to the secrets of what every private investor should know - how to secure a more certain tomorrow by embracing the risks and perils of a less-than-certain world today.”
David Kuo, The Motley Fool

The book provides a comprehensive and accessible introduction to the dynamics of personal investment in a world defined by uncertainty. It will be useful for anyone who wants to know more about how savings can be invested as a way of planning for the financial future, and how investments are managed by players in the financial services sector: banks, life companies, fund managers and advisers.

Personal investment: financial planning in an uncertain world gives practical guidance and background analysis on a wide range of issues including:

• Savings and investment choices
• Risk–return strategies
• Taxation and charges
• Financial markets
• Bubbles and the economy
• Regulation and ethics

Uniquely, the book places personal investment decisions in the wider social, economic and policy context. Regulation and ethics are shown to have a profound influence on the structure of different investment products and the nature of different investment strategies. Each chapter relates events in the wider marketplace to individual financial concerns. Global phenomena such as bank crashes, stock market bubbles and pension depletion are demystified through case studies and reflective activities.

“The pharmaceuticals industry presents a fascinating set of paradoxes. Dramatic advances in fundamental science have been associated with a wave of mergers among the leading pharmaceutical firms, the entry of small drug-discovery specialist firms, large increases in industry R&D spending and an apparent slowdown in the rate of innovation. This collection examines these paradoxes and derives important implications for our understanding of this science-based industry and for our understanding of industrial dynamics more generally. This volume will be of great interest to students of evolutionary economics, economic theorists and empirical researchers.”
David C. Mowery, University of California - Berkeley

"This volume is remarkable and exciting for several reasons - a topic of first-order social importance, outstanding authors, excellent research. Above all, it has the high energy that comes from engaging topical controversies in key areas of scholarship and public policy."
Sidney G. Winter, University of Pennsylvania

"An enriching intellectual tour through the complex and dynamic landscape of the pharmaceutical industry. The rigorous analyses contained in the volume explore a variety of the most salient issues in the economics of innovation and industry evolution."
Gary Pisano, Harry E. Figgie, Jr., Harvard Business School

Knowledge Accumulation and Industry Evolution covers these important themes:

• Brings together leading US and European scholars from a variety of research traditions
• Historical analysis of the biotechnology and pharmaceutical sector
• Examines highly topical subjects, such as GM foods and testing for breast cancer

This volume examines how the biotechnology and pharmaceutical sector is affected by the dynamics of innovation, institutions, and public policy. It contributes both theoretically and empirically to the increasingly influential Schumpetarian framework in industrial economics, which places innovation at the centre of the analysis of competition. Both quantitative and qualitative studies are included, and this varied perspective adds to the richness of the volume's insights. The contributors explore different ideas regarding the historical evolution of technology in the sector, and how firms and industry structure have co-evolved with innovation dynamics. Important policy questions are considered regarding the future of innovation in this sector and its impact on the economy.

"This excellent volume brings together some of the most influential readings in business strategy and explores the content and process of business strategy from a variety of different theoretical stances. It will serve as a comprehensive introduction to the literature and will become required reading for students of economics, organisational behavior and business"
Costas Markides, London Business School

Strategy for Business provides a comprehensive selection of essential readings, covering six key areas in business strategy:

• What is Strategy?
• Competition and Industry Effects
• Resources, Capabilities and Core Competencies
• Strategic Innovation and Firm Size
• Organisational Structures, Learning and Knowledge Management
• the Global Information Economy

 
This book will be essential reading for those seeking an understanding of the changing nature of organizations and the world of business. It is particularly intended for students taking courses in strategy, organizational change and more general management courses at undergraduate level; it will also be an excellent resource for masters and postgraduate students.

"Her [Mariana Mazzucato’s] work represents an important alternative approach to conventional theories on market structure and the evolution of industries as well as on the innovation and diffusion of new technologies within them. She models her hypotheses in a simple but rigorous way which enables not only new insights to be gained on the subject but also allows the reader to learn about computer simulation methodology and issues related to complexity. The balanced nature of the book makes it very appealing to researchers in the area; a wide literature survey; an introduction to formal economic models on the issue (with topics also raised in complexity theory), and an empirical section."
Willi Semmler, University of Bielefeld, Germany

"Mariana Mazzucato’s Firm Size, Innovation and Market Structure is a stimulating exploration of the rapidly emerging field of evolutionary industrial organization. Mazzucato’s research, which combines the insights of the classical economic tradition with the cutting-edge methodology of contemporary evolutionary and complex systems theory, provides a promising model for work in the field and poses a host of researchable and compelling questions. Students interested in pursuing the lines of enquiry pioneered by Schumpeter, Nelson, Winter and Dosi will find this book an invaluable resource."
Duncan K. Foley, New School University, US

Firm Size, Innovation and Market Structure uses evolutionary dynamic theory, non-linear mathematics and computer simulation techniques to explore the relationship between firm size, innovation and market structure.

The book begins by reviewing the connection between these variables from a theoretical and an empirical point of view, and goes on to illustrate how analytical tools may be used in order to explore Schumpeterian propositions regarding firm size, innovation and the specific role of idiosyncratic events.